In training for Chicago race, Bekele a thoroughly modern marathoner

If a man sets a goal of breaking the course record in his first run over a marathon course, it would be wise for him to learn about the terrain before the starting gun sounds.

That is exactly what Ethiopia's Kenenisa Bekele is doing as he prepares for his Oct. 12 debut at the Bank of America Chicago Marathon.

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Bekele, the greatest track distance runner of the 21st Century, will be studying in a way that reflects our times as he seeks to run one faster than the Chicago mark of 2 hours, 3 minutes, 45 seconds Kenya's Dennis Kimetto set last year.

He isn't asking countryman Tsegaye Kebede for information, even though it was Kebede's 2012 course record (2:04:38) that Kimetto broke.

And Bekele won't come to Chicago early for first-hand reconnaissance, because he doesn't want to spend any extra time away from his wife and three children, ages seven, five and 1 ½.

"I can check Google for the course," Bekele said Monday by telephone from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Chicago will be the second marathon for Bekele, 32, who holds track world records at 5,000 and 10,000 meters and has won three Olympic gold medals at those distances.

In his debut marathon April 6 in Paris, Bekele set a course record (2:05:03), a time slower than he wanted. That experience taught him several things, including the risks of making a sustained surge in the 28th kilometer of a 42-kilometer race.

"The marathon is harder than I thought," he said. "It is a very different feeling from a track and field race.

"I learned it is very important to do many long training runs, of two-to-three hours. Maybe my training was a little short. I will do more long runs before Chicago."

Bekele, who had suffered injuries that ruined his 2010 and 2011 track seasons, said he had decided long ago to try a marathon after he reached age 30.

"I am fully recovered from injury and doing well," he said.

Still, what happened in his final track races undoubtedly hastened his move to the roads.

In the first, a 10,000 meters May 31, 2013 at the Prefontaine Classic in Eugene, Ore., Bekele's time would be fourth fastest in the world for 2013. But three Ethiopians ran significantly faster two weeks later, and his June 30 effort to top their times fell far short.

That meant Bekele was denied one of the country's three places at the 2013 World Championships in the 10,000, the race Bekele had won four times at the biennial world meet. He was in the same position in the 5,000, where he had won two Olympic and three world medals.

Maybe Ethiopia should have sent Bekele anyway. Its performance in the 10,000 was the country's worst at worlds since 1991.

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Bekele has not ruled out returning to the track, but he feels no regret watching others take over that domain, even if no one has come within shouting distance of his world records – 12:37.35 for 5000 and 26:17.53 for 10.000.

"I did great things and achieved great results on the track," he said. "There is nothing left. I am completely satisfied."

Bekele surpassed the track footsteps – and world records - of the track legend he followed, countryman Haile Gebrselassie. He also went on to the marathon, where some felt Gebrselassie would crush the world record his first time out, at London in 2002.

There was a world record that day – by veteran marathoner Khalid Khannouchi, who beat the third-place Gebrselassie by 57 seconds. In his seventh attempt at the distance, at age 35, Gebrselassie finally set that world record, and he broke a year later.